... room for doubt as inadequate candidates for the sought after foundation. Descartes concludes that the foundation of all knowledge is the existence of self, since the self is the only thing that cannot ... beliefs of senses, sciences and mathematics. The first question I would like to raise is, "How does Descartes know that some sensory experiences, some scientific claims, and some mathematical truths ...

... arguments dissected, but none of the dissections I remembered really seemed to get at the heart of Descartes' argument. There's an almost Platonic assumption in his thinking. Essentially, ... " creatures. A painting of something even more fantastic would still use "real" colors. And since Descartes has a conception of an infinite being, there must really be something infinite out in the "real" world. ...

For the first couple of days we will be discussing the first two meditations of Descartes's Meditations on First Philosophy and chapter 1 of Barry Stroud's The Significance of Philosophical Skepticism . If you do not have a copy of Descartes Meditations already, you can find them online at or A pdf link [...]

... of mind and matter. He worked out laws of motion.Descartes rejected the idea that everything we observe is false or a dream by ... there fore i am), is famous. It means that because we have thoughts, we exist.Descartes' approach to science was to question everything. He worked out thing for ... the beginning.Born at La Haye, in France, Descartes was brought up as a Jesuit, travelled widely, and fought in ...

Time for some schoolbook philosophy! I read something recently about the philosopher Rene Descartes - who was fascinated by what it meant to be, what it was possible to know and what could be described as truth? Descartes decided to begin by doubting everything he possibly could - to see if he could reduce the knowable to [...]

In order to understand Spinoza's dissatisfaction with and objection to Descartes' La Dioptrique  (found in letters 39 and 40 linked below), one has to understand the opinions of those contemporary to Spinoza. Below I post a selection from Fokko Jan Dijksterhuis comprehensive book on Christian Huygens, who is well-noted for having been Spinoza's neighbor in Voorburg.   La Dioptrique was [...]